Means for cleaning the offset or impression surfaces of rotary offset printing machines



March 16 1926. 1,576,598

B. J. GQULDING MEANS FOR CLEA G THE OFFSET OR IMPRESSION SURFACES OF ROTARY OFFSET PRINTING MACH S Filed July 11 1924 2 sets-Sheet 1 March 16 1926. 1,576,598

B. J. J. GOULDING MEANS FOR CLEANING THE OFFSET OR IMPRESSION SURFACES OF ROTARY OFFSET PRINTING MACHINES Filed July 11, 19734 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Patented Mar. 16, 1926.

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE,

BENJAMIN JOSEPH JOHN GOULDING, OF ALTBINCHAM, ENGIIAND, ASSIGNOR TO LINO- TYPE AND MACHINERY LIMITED, OF LONDON, ENGLAND, A BRITISH COMPANY.

MEANS FOR CLEANING THE OFFSET 0R IMPRESSION SURFACES 0F ROTARY OFFSET PRINTING MACHINES- Application filed July 11, 1924. Serial No. 725,323.

To all whom it ma concern:

Be it known that BENJAMIN J OSEPH JOHN GOULDING, a British subject, and resident of Linotype and Machinery Works, Altrincham, in the county of Chester, England, have invented new and useful Improvements in or Relating to Means for Clean ing the Offset or Impression Surfaces of Rotary Offset Printing Machines, of which the following is a specification.

This invention relates to means for cleaning the offset or impression surfaces of rotary offset printing machines. It is articula rly applicable for use in connection with lithoaphic printing machines having cylinders clothed with rubber blankets and for that reason it is herein described in that connection,

it being understood that the term blanket cylinder as hereinafter used includes all such cylinders, whether used as transfer cylinders, impression cylinders, or as both transfer and impression cylinders.

As heretofore practiced the cleaning of such rubber blankets when rendered necessary, for example, by a change of printing plates, or set-off from the printed sheet or web, has been effected manually by the operator, the respective blanket being first wiped over with a cleaning fluid usually con- 'sisting of mixture of oils such as petroleum and paraffin, and subsequently dusted with sulphur which serves to dry any oil remaining on the blanket and at the same time has a reservative or vulcanizing action on the rub r. This method is slow and involves considerable manual labor, particularly in connection with a machine employing a number of blanket cylinders, and the object of the present invention is to reduce the time and manual labour occupied by the blanket cleaning operation, and to enable it to be effected by power-operated mechanism.

With this object in view the present invention comprises, in conjunction with a blanket cylinder, two receptacles or troughs for respectively containing cleaning fluid and sulphur, rollers or pads for applying such cleaning fluid and sulphur to the blanket, and means for transferring the said materials from the troughs to the respective rollers or pads, the mechanism being operated by aring from the driving mechanism of e press.

cleaning and sulphuring mechanisms may be brought into operation either individually, or a plurality thereof collectively, and means whereby the control of the cleaning mechanisms is associated with that of the sulphuring mechanisms so that the latter may be brought into operation when the former are rendered inoperative. The invention is hereinafter described with particular reference to the constructional forms thereof illustrated in the accampanying drawings, in which Figure 1 is a side elevation of the pertinent parts of a printing press with the invention applied thereto,

Figure 2 is a diagrammatic side elevation representing the mechanisms applied to a plurality of blanket cylinders, and

Figures 3 and 4 are detail views showing a construction of spring plunger used for alternatively connecting certain of the mechanisms.

Like reference numerals appearing in the four figures, indicate that the parts identified by them are similar to or correspond with each other.

In these drawings 1, 2 are the plate cylinders of a lithographic offset press, and 3, 4, the blanket cylinders which serve both as transfer and impression cylinders, and the primary features of the invention will be understood by a description of the mechanisms in connection with the blanket cylinder 3 shown particularly in Figure 1.

The cleaning fluid, which preferably consists of a mixture of oils such as petroleum and paraffin, is contained in a trough 5 located beneath the blanket cylinder 3, and a roller 6 (hereinafter referred to as the trough roller) is rotated in the trough 5, either continuously or intermittently, by gearing not shown in the drawings. A ductor roller 7 operates in the known manner to convey the cleaning fluid from the roller 6 to a transfer roller 8 which is continuously rotated by gearing as hereinafter described, and blanket cleaning rollers 9, 10 in permanent peripheral contact with the transfer roller 8 convey the cleaning fluid therefrom to the blanket on the cylinder 3.

The rollers 9, 10, are brought into and out of contact with the cylinder 3 by angular adjustment about the axis of thetransfer 5 roller 8, for which purpose the bearings of those rollers are at each side of the machine mounted on arms 11, 12 independently pivoted about that axis. These arms 11, 12am connected by links 13, 14 to lever arms 15, 16 re actively, which arms are fast on and exten at diametrically opposite sides of a shaft 17 mounted in the machine frame. A hand lever 18 is provided by which the shaft 17 may be rocked so that throu h the lever arms 15, 16 and links 13, 14, t e arms 11, 12 may be turned in opposite directions about the transfer roller shaft 19 and the rollers 9, 10 conse uently moved towards or away from the bla et cylinder. It will be understood that the shaft 17 extends across the machine and that the parts designated by the reference numerals 11 to 16 areduplicated at the side of the machine opposite to that shown in Figure 1.

To permit of conjoint as well as independent operation of different cleaning mechanisms in connection with a ress employing a plurality of blanket cy inders, the arrangement next to be described is provlded in t e present constructional form of the invention. The arm 16 of each cleaning mechanism is pivotally connected by a spring plunger 20 to the lower end of a link 21 whose up er end is ivoted to one arm of a bell era lever 22 igure 2) the other arm of which is ivoted to a horizontal link 23 common to all of said bell crank levers. A convenient arrangement of the spring plunger 20 is shown in Figures 3 and 4, wherein the plunger is provided with a shoulder 49 upon which bears, as represented in dotted lines, one end of a helical spring 50 whose other end engages with the adjacent end of a c linder 51 fast to the aforesaid link 21. e plunger is provided with a radially extending pin 52 adapted to en age a recess 53 in the end of the cylin er 51, as shown in Figure 3, and also, after the plunger has been disengaged from the arm16 by a slight turn of the plunger, to bear against the outer end of the cylinder 51 to hold the plunger in its disengaged position. A slight turn of the lunger in the reverse direction brings the pin 52 into register with the recess 53 and allows the spring 50 to force the plunger into engagement with the arm 16, as shown in Figure 3; The link 23 is connected through a bell crank lever 24 and link 25 with a hand lever 26 pivoted to the machine frame in' a position conveniently adjacent to the folding mechanism 27, by which lever all the cleaning mechanisms may be simultaneously thrown into or out of operation. In the event, however, of it being required to operate an individual cleaning mechanism 1ndepen ently of the others, such independent operation is permitted after disconnectin the respective arm 16 from the associate link 21 by Withdrawing the appropriate spring plunger 20.

The apparatus for applying sulphur to the blanket after the latter has been cleaned, comprises a sulphur trough 28, a trough roller 29 rotated therein and a roller 30 in permanent peripheral contact with the roller 29 and adapted to be bought into and out of contact with the blanket cylinder. For this latter purpose the bearing at each end of the roller 30 is carried in an arm 31 adapted to be rocked about the axis of. the

transfer roller shaft 32, a hand lever 33 fast to or inte ral with one of said arms being provided or effecting the rocking movement. To enable a plurality of sulphur mechanisms to be brought into and out of operation either independentl or conjointly, an arrangement similar to t at above described in connection with the cleaning mechanism may be provided as shown particularl in Figure 2, where links 34 are connected by spring plungers 35 to the respective hand levers 33 and through bell crank levers'36, link 37 bell crank lever 38 and link 39 to a hand lever 40.

As the sulphuring operation necessarily follows the application of the cleaning fluid, it is convenient to provide means whereby the sulphuring rollers 30 may be-brought into action simultaneously with the throwing out of action of the cleaning rollers 9, 10. The above described conjoint o crating mechanism for the cleaning and su phuring rollers respectively lends itself to a convenient arrangement for the attainment of this result, which arrangement is illustrated in Figure 2. As there shown, the hand levers 26 and 40 are connected by a link 41 so located with relation to the pivots of those levers that, when the hand lever 26 is depressed to. render the cleanin rollers inoperative the lever 40 will be raised to bring the sulphur rollers into contact with the blanket cylinders. The permit the sulphuring rollers to besubse'uently brou ht out of operation withoutv a ectin'g the c caning rollers the link 41 is connected to the lever 40 by a spring plunger 42 which may be withdrawn to permit independent operation of the hand lever 40.

The before mentioned spring plungers 35 and 42 are substantially of the same construction as that illustrated in Figures 3 and 4 in connection with the plunger 20.

It is desirable that the rollers of the respective mechanisms should not rotate durin the normal operation of'the press, and this result may be conveniently obtained by, for example, the means next described. In this example, the rollers 8, 29 are driven respectively through vertical shafts 43, 44 by bevel gears from a horizontal shaft 45 blanket.

which, by a clutch 46, can, when desired, be operatively connected to and disconnected from a driving shaft 47, which clutch may be operated by a hand lever 48 located in a convenient position near the hand levers for controlling the operation of the respective mechanisms.

If desired, the rollers 9, 10 and 30 or any of them may be reciprocated axially, and also if desired, the control of the cleaning and sulphuring mechanisms may be associated with that of any other of the organs of the press which it may be considered desirable to bring into or out of operation simultaneously with and through the act of bringing these mechanisms themselves into or out of operation.

It is to be understood that wherever the construction admits of it, and such a change would be beneficial, an of the before described hand-operated lbvers may be substituted by foot-operated devices and for that reason the following claims are to be read as including all such devices.

Having described my invention, I declare that what I claim and desire to secure by Letters Patent is 1. In a rotary oflset printing machine, the combination with a blanket cylinder, of blanket-drying apparatus comprising a sulphur trough and a oweroperated roller adapted to transfer su phur therefrom to the 2. In a rotary offset rinting machine, the combination with a blanket cylinder, of blanket-cleaning apparatus comprising 'a cleaning fluid trough, a power-operated roller adapted to receive fluid from said trough and means adapted to bring the roller into and out of contact with the blanket, and blanket-drying apparatus comprising a sulphur trough and a power-operated roller adapted to transfer sulphur therefrom to the blanket.

3. In a lithographic printing press, the combination with a plurality of blanket cylinders and blanket-cleaning apparatus appropriate to each cylinder comprising a cleaning fluid trough and a owe r-operated roller adapted to receive uid from said combination with a plurality of blanket cylinders and blanket drying apparatus ap propriate to each cylinder comprising a sulphur trough and a power-operated roller adapted to transfer sulphur from said trough to the blanket, of mechanism operative to bring said rollers into' and out of contact with the blanket either individually or a plurality thereof collectively:

5. In a lithographic printing press, the combination with a plurality of blanket cylinders, blanket-cleaning apparatus appropriate to each cylinder comprising a cleaning fluid trough and a power-operated cleaning roller adapted to receive fluid from said trough and blanket drying apparatus appropriate to each cylinder comprising a sulphur trough and a power-operated roller adapted totransfer sulphur from said trough to the blanket, of mechanisms operative to bring said cleaning and drying rollers into and out of contact with the blanket either individually or a plurality thereof collectively. I

6. In a lithographic printing press, the combination with a plurality of blanket cylinders, blanket-cleaning apparatus appropriate ,to each cylinder comprising a cleaning fluid trough and a power-operated cleaning roller adapted to receive flllld from said trough and blanket drying apparatus appropriate to each cylinder-comprising a sulphur trough and a power-operated roller adapted to transfer sulphur from said trough to the blanket, of mechanisms operative to bring said cleaning and drying rollers into and out of contactwith the blanket either individually or a plurality thereof collectively, and mechanism adapted 'to render the drying apparatus operative simultaneously with the t rowing out of operation of the cleaning apparatus.

In testimony whereof I have aflixed my signature hereto.

BENJAMIN JOSEPH JOHN GOULDING. 

